Can’t figure out which game to get the Xbox fan in your life? I searched Xbox’s catalog for the best titles across a variety of genres to find the best picks. Let’s dive in.
Before You Gift a Game This Christmas
It’s best to be sure of the type of Xbox Series console the person has before gifting them a game. If they have an Xbox Series X, you can buy both a digital and physical copy for them since it has a disc drive. However, digital copies are the only option if they own an Xbox Series S since it doesn’t have a disc drive.
1 Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
2024’s Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 saw players treated to a critically acclaimed campaign. You play as a pair of CIA agents in the early 1990s, forced to go rogue to take down a terrorist organization. The gunplay feels great, the missions are varied, the gadgets are fun, and the game is highly replayable.
After the campaign, you can move on to multiplayer, with the usual grab bag of fun modes like Team Deathmatch, Hardpoint, Kill Confirmed, Infected, and Gunfight. Then you have the Zombies mode, a horde-based mode with unique weapons, well-crafted maps, and revamped movement mechanics.
2 Forza Horizon 5
Forza Horizon 5 may be old, but it still offers one of the best racing experiences on the Xbox. You get an adventurous single-player campaign that sees you racing across Mexico, with action taking place in various locations and environments including jungles, mountains, and deserts. There’s even a volcano!
The game is packed with a variety of modes and activities that encourage you to explore the open environments. It has plenty of cars to unlock and tune up to your liking. It’s also very arcade-like, as opposed to being a racing simulator, so it’s easy to pick up. Sadly, it will probably be delisted from the Xbox store and unplayable to anyone who doesn’t own it.
3 EA Sports FC 25
EA Sports FC 25 marks the second release of EA’s soccer series without the FIFA branding. It still has its signature brand of realism and strategic gameplay built upon previous titles and improved with each entry. FC 25 has enhanced movement, sophisticated AI, more stadiums, and improved shooting and dribbling animations.
Besides Ultimate Team and Career mode, FC 25 includes a brand new mode called Rush. It’s a 5v5 co-op experience, where four players and an AI-controlled goalkeeper face off with another team in a seven-minute match to score the most goals.
4 Street Fighter 6
Street Fighter is a household name in the fighting genre. This 6th mainline entry has a strong cast of diverse fighters and the all-new Drive Gauge, a mechanic that allows your character to unleash new special attacks. There is also World Tour Mode, where you create your character and embark on a journey to prove you can stand with the greats like Ryu, Chun-Li, Guile, Cammy, and even M. Bison and Akuma.
Metaphor: ReFantazio is a game from the masterminds behind the critically acclaimed Persona and Shin Megami Tensei series, Atlus. It mixes real-time and turn-based combat while incorporating its signature mechanics for exploiting enemy weaknesses to gain a strategic advantage during battles.
Metaphor: ReFantazio also features a strong narrative packed with social commentary and a great soundtrack. It’s one of the most well-received new RPGs in years.
6 Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle does a lot to differentiate itself from its peers like the Uncharted and modern Tomb Raider games. It’s not a guns-blazing, high-octane thrill ride from start to finish but a slower-paced adventure that emphasizes melee combat, stealth, and puzzles, coupled with detailed locations and an immersive first-person camera.
It’s everything one would want in an Indiana Jones game. You travel the globe, punching and shooting the bad guys, cracking your whip to get out of sticky situations. Not to mention, Troy Baker does an excellent job imitating a young Harrison Ford.
7 Resident Evil 4 (Remake)
In Resident Evil 4, you play Leon S. Kennedy, a Secret Service agent tasked with rescuing the president’s daughter from cultists in a rural area of Spain. Since this is a Resident Evil game, you will fight your share of grotesque monsters and mutants using an arsenal of guns that are just fun to use.
The game isn’t scary in the conventional sense, but the horror comes from the atmosphere and highly tense encounters that make every shot count. It’s a must-play survival horror game for fans of the genre.
8 Animal Well
Animal Well is a 2D pixel-graphics platformer, where you play a blob and explore animal-themed zones. It’s a Metroidvania, a subgenre where characters gain access previously inaccessible areas by obtaining new abilities and items. The game is centered around clever puzzles that make exploration fun and rewarding, and the game has proved to be a critical hit.
9 Overcooked: All You Can Eat
The premise of Overcooked: All You Can Eat is simple: work together in different kitchen environments, putting ingredients together to make a meal, and fulfilling orders before the timer runs out. The environments tend to have chaotic and wacky conditions, requiring players to coordinate effectively and beat them.
It’s a great gift if you’re spending a lot of time together during the holidays. Be sure to bring enough controllers so that others can join the fun—it supports up to four players.
10 Minecraft
Minecraft is a game that allows you to let your imagination run wild by building anything you can imagine using blocks. The core gameplay loop is simple and timeless: explore the procedurally-generated world, harvest materials, and build structures. Learning these systems will also help you survive, especially at night when you must fend off the monsters.
It’s especially great for kids because it’s easy to pick up, has colorful graphics, and encourages creativity and problem-solving. On top of that, it can help them build their social skills since it has split-screen and online co-op. The game is still going strong in 2024, with constant updates that refresh the game’s content.
Several of the games mentioned here, like Black Ops 6, Indiana Jones, Forza, and FC 25, are on Game Pass. If you don’t have a specific game in mind, why not gift them a Game Pass Ultimate membership? This will give them access to hundreds more games so they won’t be bored during the holidays and beyond.
